Sheer Lacy Abandon: Penny Vincenzi and Shirley Conran

I can’t be the only person who was thinking this.

Yesterday’s New York Times book review was of a new novel by an Englishwoman named Penny Vincenzi. The book is titled Sheer Abandon, and it is, apparently, the kind of summer fluff that now and then every girl needs to inhale. Edith is the kind of girl who doesn’t look like she inhales, but you can bet your bippy, she does. Not often; just now and then. As Auntie Mame said, “On festive occasions.”

So I read the review, which was pretty enthusiastic, almost affectionate, saying, basically, “Ok, this is fluff, but as fluff goes, it was fun.” Which is great. What I couldn’t help thinking, though – and this is what I can’t believe wasn’t in the review – is that Vincenzi’s novel sounds like it’s basically a re-write of the classic beach novel Lace, by Shirley Conran.

I can’t remember when I first read Lace, but it was a long time ago. It was a fat chunk of a mass-market paperback. It was like a Judith Krantz novel, but a little classier – not in writing style, but in name-dropping. Conran was clearly from a different world than Krantz; the levels of brand consciousness were different. Conran’s consciousness was much higher than Krantz’s. (I’m not insulting at all; just making distinctions between the two. One would regard Pratesi sheets as a given; the other would not even know to notice them, at least not in her authorial youth.) (And incidentally, the only reason I know about Pratesi sheets is, I think, another 1980s artifact entitled The JAP Handbook, but that’s a subject for another time.)

Lace is about a child’s quest for information: abandoned as an infant, the teenager runs away from a sad foster home and winds up as a porno star looking for her mother. As I recall, a TV movie starred Phoebe Cates in this role, must check to see if that’s on DVD. It was, I must emphasize, a startlingly vapid book, but Conran also had a real way with her story; there were a million details in there that were just irresistible. I must have read that book five times. But as happens, books get lost or thrown away, and sometime about 15 years ago I got rid of my copy of Lace.

It was only a few months ago that I remembered the novel and realized I’d like to re-read it. I found a copy in a used book store for a dollar and picked it up; I could hardly wait to get home and re-read it. I was actually quite confident that I’d be annoyed and disgusted with it now. I was sure that Conran’s writing would seem worse than I remembered, and that my affection would sour on re-examination. You know something? I was wrong. In fact, I like and respect this piece of crap even more now than I did when I was 15. So go figure.

I wish Penny Vincenzi all luck with her Sheer Abandon, I really do; I’ll have a look at it one of these days. But I hope that her reading public will remember that Shirley Conran got there first, and did it with style. And high-quality, high thread count sheets.

The Case of the I Don't Care: or, You Should Read Sarah Caudwell Because I Said So.

Some weeks ago I borrowed a stack of books from the public library, as is, as you know, my wont.

One of them I was particularly excited about. It was called The Case of the Missing Books, by someone named Ian Sansom, and it was, according to the back cover, a sort of comic mystery novel, set in Ireland, featuring Our Hero, a Jewish vegetarian Londoner named Israel Armstrong, who goes off to Ireland to start his new job as a small-town librarian, only to find that all the library books are gone.
Ok, so, it doesn’t sound like a roller coaster of a book, but it sounded like it would probably be an extremely pleasant book to read. Genial, probably a few good laughs, well written.
Unfortunately – and I feel really, really horrible about saying this – the book is genial, but not much more. The truth is, I renewed this book once, and was still so bored by it, that I returned it today, without reading – get this – the last five pages. I read most of it last night, when I realized I owed late fees for the thing. I vowed to finish it before bringing it back today. I bought myself some time by (now, this is funny) going to have a pedicure, which meant I could read while someone took care of my feet (Edith has delicate feet, they need tending, not unlike baby sheep gamboling in fields of clover and daisies). So I read up to five pages to the end, sitting in the nail salon. And then I walked the two blocks to the library, realized how little of the book was left, and said, “Eh, screw it,” and put the book in the return drop.
To not read the last five pages, I must really, really have not cared. The fact that I had this book in my house for three weeks and couldn’t be moved to finish it more promptly? Not good. I am sorry. I’m sure that Mr. Sansom can turn out a charming funny mystery, but this one isn’t it. I was just bored beyond all sense. Somewhere, I think on Amazon.com, I read someone comparing this to all those Alexander McCall Smith books, none of which I’ve read. Well, let me say, if Alexander McCall Smith is like this – vaguely cutesy, not as funny as one hopes – then I’m just as happy that I’ve never cracked even one of his books. I’ve sold quite a few – I even bought one as a gift once – but I don’t need to read them. No, I have one absolute FAVORITE mystery novel, which I’m now re-reading, to comfort myself and cleanse my palate. It’s by Sarah Caudwell: Thus Was Adonis Murdered. THAT I can recommend. And it’s in print; if you want to read it (which I hope you do – it’s a sort of academic/mystery, set in London and Venice, and incredibly funny and dry and wonderful), you’ll have no trouble getting a copy.

Ian Sansome: One Star.
Sarah Caudwell: All The Stars There Are In Heaven.